March for Peace in Phnom Penh, December 18, 2025. Source: Social Media
Peace Rally in Long Beach on 12/14/2025
Cambodia–Thailand Conflict: Power Politics, the Cost of Silence, and Lessons for Cambodia
The Current Crisis
The armed conflict between Thailand and Cambodia reignited on December 7, 2025, following the collapse of the July ceasefire brokered by U.S. President Donald Trump, and Malaysian Prime Minister and ASEAN Chair Anwar Ibrahim. This escalation marks a direct defiance mainly by Thailand of the Kuala Lumpur Joint Declaration, signed just weeks earlier on October 26, which demanded the full and effective implementation of peace measures.
The renewed fighting has produced serious humanitarian, economic, political, and regional consequences. As the situation intensifies, both governments continue to deflect responsibility, each blaming the other for triggering the latest violence, while trading accusations of targeting civilians. Suspicion, distrust, and war of words between the two countries dominate the narrative of the conflict.
Based on publicly available reports, the confrontation has escalated into a blowout conflict involving heavy artillery, rocket attacks—including Cambodian BM-21 rockets striking Thai areas—Thai F-16 airstrikes, naval deployments, drones, tanks, rockets, and ground troop incursions into Cambodian border areas. These developments have generated allegations of war crimes, including the intentional targeting of innocent civilians.
The fighting has resulted in substantial losses on both sides, killing more than 40 people and displacing close to one million civilians collectively. Thailand has reported 21 soldiers killed and approximately 400,000 civilians displaced within its border provinces. Cambodian sources have claimed at least 21 civilian deaths and 85 injuries, with a total of 544,703 displaced persons—including 285,544 women and 174,006 children—following Thai airstrikes and bombings near populated areas such as Poipet as of December 22, 2025.
Yet under the rule of former Prime Minister and current President of the Senate Hun Sen, the Cambodian government has deliberately refused to disclose the number of Khmer soldiers killed. Military casualties are treated as political liabilities rather than as human losses deserving public acknowledgment. Disclosure would expose military weaknesses and undermine the regime’s carefully constructed narrative that Cambodia is firmly and successfully defending its sovereignty. Casualty transparency has therefore never been institutionalized—not out of necessity, but out of fear: fear of accountability, fear of public scrutiny, and fear of the truth. In this system, fallen front-line soldiers are rendered invisible, their sacrifices subordinated to regime preservation and image management.
The surprise Thai strike on December 7, 2025, appeared intended to deliver a decisive blow to Cambodian military capabilities by targeting infrastructure and weapons sites. While Cambodia claimed victim and acted defensively, Thailand cites provocations. However, the stark military power imbalance between the two countries demands greater restraint from Thailand to avoid perceptions and realities of coercion and bullying.
Power Politics and the Cost of Silence
The United States, ASEAN, China, the European Union, and other international actors have called for an end to hostilities, the withdrawal of heavy weapons, and full implementation of the Kuala Lumpur Peace Accords. They have urged both sides to exercise maximum restraint, restore trust, and return to dialogue through bilateral and ASEAN-led mechanisms. Until now, no country besides Cambodia has explicitly condemned Thailand’s excessive military actions—by air, sea, and ground—on Cambodian soil.
Yet the ASEAN special foreign ministers’ meeting held in Kuala Lumpur on December 22, 2025, ended without a breakthrough ceasefire. The primary outcome was merely a scheduled follow-up meeting of the General Border Committee on December 24 to discuss the technical implementation and verification of a potential truce. Thailand, meanwhile, demanded three rigid conditions: Cambodia must declare a ceasefire first as the alleged aggressor; the ceasefire must be real and continuous; and Cambodia must demonstrate sincerity, particularly in clearing landmines—an issue that Cambodia struggles to address unilaterally and that Thailand itself insists must be resolved jointly.
For more than nineteen consecutive days, my homeland has endured sustained air, naval, and ground attacks across multiple provinces. Bombs have fallen, civilians have fled, schoolchildren have fled classrooms, and explosions have rocked communities. Villages, hotels, bridges, and sacred temples have been destroyed. Yet the international response to the suffering of Cambodian civilians has been strikingly muted.
Peace marches in Phnom Penh and demonstrations by the Cambodian diaspora across the globe have drawn thousands calling for an end to the disproportionate violence, reflecting widespread fear and the collapse of daily life on both sides. This recurring international silence is not accidental. It is the predictable outcome of enduring power politics—possibly driven by domestic agendas, including Thailand’s “war on scams,” rather than purely by security concerns. These are the same forces that have shaped Cambodia’s tragic modern history.
It is a continual tragedy that innocent civilians and poor frontline soldiers always pay the price for the failures of their leaders. This conflict exposes an inconvenient truth. When leaders weaponize nationalism and value personalized power over people, pride over peace, and control over compassion, they outsource suffering to those with the least social rank. History shows this again and again from Cambodia’s past conflicts everywhere.
This is not the first time Cambodia has learned that international law is applied unevenly, or that moral outrage depends less on human suffering than on strategic convenience.
Vietnam Condemned, Thailand Shielded: The Double Standard of Power Politics
Why was Cambodia condemned when invaded by Vietnam, but ignored when bombed by Thailand?
In my view, when Vietnam invaded Cambodia in 1979, the world reacted swiftly. The United States, China, ASEAN, and Europe condemned Vietnam and treated Cambodia as a victim of foreign aggression—even though the Khmer Rouge had just committed genocide against its own people. This outrage was driven not by humanitarian concern, but by Cold War geopolitics; Cambodia mattered then because it sat at the center of a global power struggle.
Today, Cambodia bleeds again—this time in near silence.
The difference is not the scale of suffering, but political power and reliable media coverage. Thailand is economically and militarily stronger, diplomatically better connected, and strategically more valuable. Conversely, Cambodia is weaker, poorer, and politically marginalized. Decision-making is highly centralized at the top, where loyalty matters more than competence. Furthermore, weak and hollow public institutions leave no safe exit for the country’s leadership and its people when losing power often feels like a matter of life or death because there are no independent establishments to protect anyone.
Cambodia is also losing the information war. The lack of an independent press has made it difficult for the government to communicate its side of the story. The authorities have systematically dismantled independent media, including Radio Free Asia (RFA) and The Cambodia Daily in 2017, culminating in the 2023 shutdown of Voice of Democracy (VOD). Journalists who dare to expose uncomfortable truths—around land seizures, corruption, scam compounds, or political abuses—often face surveillance, harassment, exile, or imprisonment, as seen in the 2024 case of Mech Dara.
As long as the conflict is framed as a “bilateral border dispute,” powerful actors can avoid accountability, hide behind calls for restraint, and preserve regional stability at Cambodia’s expense.
This pattern is painfully familiar. Cambodia has long been treated not as a sovereign equal, but as a space where others settle their rivalries—from the U.S. bombing during the Vietnam War, to the Vietnamese occupation, and the international compromises that prioritized 'stability' over justice and accountability for Khmer Rouge victims. Each time, Cambodia has paid the price for both its own leadership’s and others’ miscalculations.
The current crisis exposes an uncomfortable truth: international silence is not neutrality; it is a choice shaped by political power. Yet Cambodia must also confront a harder question—not only what the world is doing, but what Cambodia itself must do differently.
For decades, Cambodia has relied on external protectors instead of building resilient national capacity. Dependency has weakened diplomacy, undermined credibility, and narrowed strategic options. When crises erupt, Cambodia appeals to international sympathy rather than international leverage—and history shows that sympathy is unreliable.
Four Essential Lessons for Cambodia
To avoid repeating its past and break the cycle of dependency and victimization, Cambodia must transform its strategic outlook:
1. Adopt Moral Clarity over Political Rhetoric: Cambodia must speak with moral clarity, not just political rhetoric excess. Inflammatory language may serve domestic politics and promote nationalism, but it alienates the global community and the opposition. Consistent, evidence-based advocacy carries more weight than emotional appealsand condemnations.
2. Strengthen Strategic Autonomy: Cambodia must strengthen strategic autonomy. True sovereignty is not declared; it is built—through credible institutions, professional diplomacy, and diversified partnerships. Overreliance on any single external power only deepens vulnerability when conflict arises.
3. Internationalize Principles, Not Grievances: Cambodia must internationalize principles, not personalities. Rather than framing disputes through nationalism or grievance, Cambodia should anchor its case in international humanitarian law, civilian protection, and documented evidence. The world may ignore border claims, but it cannot indefinitely dismiss sustained and systemic attacks on innocent civilians.
4. Demand Regional Accountability: Cambodia must invest in regional law, not regional silence. ASEAN’s norm of non-interference has too often become an excuse for inaction. Cambodia should push ASEAN to move beyond "non-interference." The bloc requires active mechanisms to enforce ceasefires and protect civilians, rather than merely issuing statements of concern.
Conclusion
Who pays the price? In this conflict, poor villagers—mostly at the border—lose their homes and livelihoods; conscripts and low-ranking soldiers face death on the front line; families carry trauma for generations; and children lose their education. All the while, the elites remain protected and untouched. This is not true nationalism (protecting the people); it is the moral failure of political leaders.
The Lessons of History: Cambodia must remember that peace without dignity is fragile. History shows that burying injustice in the name of stability only postpones future violence. The lessons of the Khmer Rouge era, the Vietnamese invasion and occupation, and now the Thai-Cambodian conflict all point to the same truth: unresolved power imbalances breed recurring crises. Cambodia cannot change global power politics, but it can refuse to be endlessly trapped by them. The world may remain quiet today; Cambodia’s responsibility is to ensure that silence does not become destiny.
A Path Toward Peace: Leaders from both sides can transform this conflict from ultra-nationalist rhetoric (protecting power) to peace-building initiatives—moving from political gain, distrust, and control toward shared prosperity, stability, and trust building. These initiatives require bilateral negotiations in good faith (openly and honestly), independent mediation via ASEAN or the ICJ, joint border economic zones, and cultural and historical exchange programs. Ultimately, peace-building benefits both leaders and the people.
Note: My observation is based on the available public information and my field trip to Cambodia during the armed fighting between Cambodia and Thailand from July 24 - 28, 2025; however, classified information by top leaders could alter specific information about the direct implication of the re-escalation of the conflict. This piece has been refined with the help of AI to enhance content flow, clarity, and readability. The insights and perspectives expressed, however, are entirely my own.
References:
21 Cambodian civilians dead, over 500,000 displaced by Thai aggression. December 23, 2025 https://www.khmertimeskh.com/501813657/21-cambodian-civilians-dead-over-500000-displaced-by-thai-aggression/
No ceasefire agreement at ASEAN meeting, GBC set for Dec 24, says Thai FM. December 22, 2025. https://www.nationthailand.com/news/general/40060161
ASEAN Foreign Ministers’ Meeting Ends As Border Clashes Continue, Says Cambodia’s National Defense Ministry. December 22, 2025.
https://cambojanews.com/asean-foreign-ministers-meeting-ends-as-border-clashes-continue-says-cambodias-national-defense-ministry/#:~:text=The%20meeting%20welcomed%20discussions%20on,and%20verification%20of%20the%20ceasefire.
Fresh clashes erupt on Thai-Cambodia border as ASEAN convenes peace talks..
December 22, 2025.
Be a Patriot, Not a Nationalist. December 20, 2025.
https://cambodianess.com/by_author?name=jay-sophalkalyan
China envoy visits Cambodia seeking to de-escalate fighting with Thailand: Deng Xijun visits as Washington and Beijing renew efforts toward ceasefire. December 20, 2025.
Scam Centers Fueling Thailand's Border War With Cambodia: UN Says Southeast Asian Scam Centers Generate $41 Billion in Illicit Annual Profits. December 19, 2025. https://www.bankinfosecurity.com/scam-centers-fueling-thailands-border-war-cambodia-a-30347
Türk alarmed by spiralling Thai-Cambodia conflict and impact on civilians.
18 December 2025
Thailand, Cambodia escalate conflict, demonstrating limits of diplomacy. December 16, 2025
https://www.aspistrategist.org.au/thailand-cambodia-escalate-conflict-demonstrating-limits-of-diplomacy/
Cambodia claims Thai bombing is deep into territory near shelters for displaced. Heavy combat between Thailand and Cambodia has entered a second week, with Cambodia claiming Thai bombing is hitting deeper into its territory. December 15, 2025.
Thailand launches new offensive as Cambodia halts all border crossings: A Royal Thai Navy spokesman says its military launched an operation to reclaim border ‘territories’ in Trat province. December 14, 2025. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/12/14/thailand-launches-new-offensive-as-cambodia-halts-all-border-crossings
Why the Thailand-Cambodia ceasefire is failing: The truce did not address the root cause of the conflict. A new initiative with a clear enforcement mechanism is needed
December 14, 2025. https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2025/12/14/why-the-thailand-cambodia-ceasefire-is-failing
Top general explains why Thailand needs to "disable" Cambodia’s military capabilities. December 13, 2025.
Thai and Cambodian Troops Again Clash Along Disputed Border: The two governments have accused the other of responsibility for a string of incidents that threaten to ignite another full-scale border conflict. December 8, 2025.
https://thediplomat.com/2025/12/thai-and-cambodian-troops-again-clash-along-disputed-border/
Why Cambodia Is Losing the Information War With Thailand: The lack of an independent press has made it hard for the government to communicate its side of the story. August 6, 2025.
https://thediplomat.com/2025/08/why-cambodia-is-losing-the-information-war-with-thailand/
Personality over protocol:Thailand-Cambodia tensions reveal ASEAN’s quiet crisis
Why Did Hun Sen Call For Regime Change in Thailand? It is hard to see what Cambodia’s former leader gained by openly violating the regional norm against mutual non-interference.
July 1, 2025.
https://thediplomat.com/2025/07/why-did-hun-sen-call-for-regime-change-in-thailand/
Cambodia’s Hun Sen urges change in Thai leadership over border dispute: Cambodia’s provocations add to the worries of Thai Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra. June 27, 2025.
No comments:
Post a Comment